New On DVD – May 4, 2010
Posted May 4, 2010 12:00 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus CityNews.ca Pick of the Week – Heath Ledger’s last film is also one of director Terry Gilliam’s most adventurous endeavors. Following an extraordinary travelling theatre company where visitors are taken to a magical world inside of Dr. Parnassus’s mind, the film is a special effects driven masterpiece that uniquely deals with Ledger’s untimely passing by bringing in Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell to finish his part. Like Gilliam’s convoluted 12 Monkeys and Brazil, words don’t do it justice and you have to see The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus in order to understand it. Special features include commentary with Gilliam, an interview with Heath Ledger, a deleted scene, and more. Also available on Blu-ray. Film **** DVD *** (out of 5 stars).
Read a CityNews.ca interview with director Terry Gilliam about The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Tetro (Blu-ray) – Seventeen-year-old Bennie (Alden Ehrenreich) heads to Buenos Aires in search of his older brother Tetro (Vincent Gallo), who has been missing for the last 10 years. When the two eventually reconnect, and Bennie moves in with Tetro and his girlfriend Miranda (Maribel Verdú), he finds an unfinished play his brother has been working on, finishes it and submits it to a festival. Family secrets are soon uncovered as the two brothers grow closer. Written and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, and shot mostly in black and white, the film is visually beautiful and resembles the theme and style of Coppola’s 1983 film Rumble Fish. Special features on the Blu-ray include commentary with Coppola and Ehrenreich, a featurette on the cinematography of Tetro, plus more. Film *** Blu-ray **** (out of 5 stars).
Nine – Struggling to come up with an idea for his next film, Italian movie director Guido Contini (Day-Lewis) looks to all the women in his life for inspiration. His mistress Carla (Penélope Cruz), wife Luisa (Marion Cottillard), muse Claudia (Nicole Kidman), mother (Sophia Loren), and friend Lilli (Judi Dench) all leave him empty and distraught. He dreams about his childhood crush Saraghina (Fergie from the Black Eyed Peas) and Vanity Fair reporter Stephanie (Kate Hudson) but is still left blank. His film career and personal life eventually crash and Contini disappears from the spotlight. You’d think that casting a slew of hot, exotic female actresses along with Day-Lewis in a big screen adaptation of a hit Broadway musical (itself based on the classic Fellini film 8 1/2) would be a winner. Not so with Nine. It’s a boring, sloppy, headache-inducing disaster that doesn’t even offer up a memorable song to take away. Special features include commentary, the featurette Behind the Look of Nine, plus more. Also available on Blu-ray. Film ** DVD ** (out of 5 stars).
Leap Year (Blu-ray) – Anna (Amy Adams) is a cute-as-a-button, well-to-do apartment stager (anyone who watches HGTV knows that a stager is someone who is hired to come in and furnish a home to help the owner sell it faster) who wants to get married. Her boyfriend of four years, Jeremy (Adam Scott), is a clean-cut, pompous cardiologist who doesn’t seem interested in marriage. When Anna’s father (John Lithgow) tells her about an old Irish tradition where it’s okay for a woman to ask a man to marry her on February 29, Anna gets it in her head as the right thing to do. Jeremy just happens to be in Dublin for a medical conference so Anna hops on a plane and goes to ask him to marry her. A series of lame events soon follow and Anna enlists pub owner Declan (Matthew Goode) to help her get to Jeremy. Of course somewhere along the way, the two fall in love and Anna realizes Declan is the one she should be with. There’s so much wrong with Leap Year it’s almost worth watching just to see what a film is not supposed to look like. Special features on the Blu-ray release include deleted scenes. Film ** Blu-ray ** (out of 5 stars).
District 13: Ultimatum – Returning to the Paris ghetto known as “District 13”, Damien (Cyril Raffaelli) and Leito (David Belle) attempt to bring peace among the five gang bosses who run the area before the secret service declares war on them. Written by Luc Besson, this follow-up to the 2004 film District 13 is more of the same martial arts action, however, it feels like it’s lacking something compared to the first. If you’ve never seen the original, check it out instead. Special features include a making-of, deleted scenes, plus more. Also available on Blu-ray. Film ** DVD ** (out of 5 stars).
More New DVD releases this week: Tokyo Sonata, Tooth Fairy, Dirt: Season 2, Iron Man: The Complete Animated Series, Saving Private Ryan (Blu-ray), Dr. Zhivago (Blu-ray)
brian.mckechnie@citynews.rogers.com
Top image: A scene from The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. Courtesy E1 Entertainment.
